With all of the hullabaloo at CMEpalooza headquarters regarding Monday morning’s drawing for the winner of our Spring Company Spotlight, it has come to my attention that I forgot to inform everyone of the lucky winner. It was Global Academy for Medical Education. Congrats, folks.

If you are desperate need of entertainment this morning, you can watch a replay of the drawing here. Derek is a weird shade of blue as he has his usual technological struggles.

Our external monitors from PricewaterhouseCoopers are just out of the picture over my left shoulder, but they have signed an attestation as to the winning entry. There apparently is some sort of controversy that has nothing to do with CMEpalooza regarding the work of these folks, but rest assured that their signature on a piece of paper means a lot to us!

More info coming soon on exactly what this Spotlight event is all about and when it will be held.

 

Hey gang! Derek here. I wanted to have a little chat with all of you about CMEpalooza. Not the actual Spring event, mind you. Until we have the agenda totally set (we’re almost there), we don’t have much more to tell you about it. No, I’ve been noticing a disturbing trend lately, and I wanted to bring it to a quick end. I’m here to talk to you about the word “CMEpalooza.”

Here’s the thing — it’s”CMEpalooza.” It’s not “CMEPalooza” or “CMEPALOOZA” or…(ugh)…”CME palooza.” It’s one word with the first three letters capitalized. It’s a mash up of “CME” and “palooza.” It’s a palooza of CME. It’s CMEpalooza.

In one of the first emails Scott sent me when we first started working on CMEpalooza together, he referred to it as “CMEPalooza.” I responded to him with a threat of fisticuffs if he ever spelled it that way again. It’s one of the few arguments I’ve ever won with him. To be fair, most of our arguments rarely extend beyond this exchange:

Me: Hey, should we try this?
Scott: No.
Me: Why not?
Scott: Because it’s dumb.
Me: Good point.

So, winning this argument was no great feat. Still, I even had “CMEpalooza” t-shirts made. See?

What I’m trying to-…wait a minute. Are you thinking what I’m thinking? That’s right — CMEPALOOZA T-SHIRT CANNON AT THE NEXT ALLIANCE CONFERENCE!!! I can see it now. The first day’s keynote speaker finishes up and we’re just about ready to break for the first round of plenary sessions, when all of a sudden a loud siren begins to sound, I run onto the stage with a massive t-shirt cannon while Scott grabs the microphone and yells out “WHO WANTS A T-SHIRT?!?” The crowd goes wild as  Montell Jordan’s “This Is How We Do It”  blares overhead and I begin firing t-shirts left and right. Man, that would be great.

Where was I? Oh, right — just remember: If you’re writing it out, it’s “CMEpalooza.” All one word, no capital “P.” Now, does anyone know where I can rent a t-shirt cannon for cheap?

Somewhere in the not-so-fine print of the CMEpalooza 2017 Sponsorship prospectus is this little wrinkle, “NEW IN 2017: All silver sponsors receive an entry in our drawing for a FREE CMEpalooza Company Spotlight.” 

Honestly, part of me included this because I feel bad for Derek. CMEpalooza Spotlight was his baby way back in the infancy of CMEpalooza, and it simply never caught on. But there is also a part of me who thought that it was actually a pretty interesting idea that shouldn’t just die on the vine.

In June 2015, we had one 30-minute pilot broadcast with Educational Measures that was well attended and I thought was pretty darn interesting, but poof, no one signed up for another. As with many innovations, CMEpalooza Spotlight appears to need a little push to get it rolling downhill, which is why we added that little perk to our higher tiers of sponsorship this year.

We’ll be holding our CMEpalooza Spring Company Spotlight drawing on Monday (held in an über secret location that will probably be leaked to the media by one of our disgruntled interns in an hour or so). Consider this a final reminder to any organizations on the fence about a premium sponsorship – if you want in, you need to let us know ASAP if you want to qualify for this drawing. We currently have 2 Gold sponsors and 4 Silver sponsors for our Spring event, which leaves room for 2 more Silver sponsors.

Once we have selected a winner in our random drawing, we’ll start putting the wheels in motion for the Spotlight broadcast itself and provide everyone with more details.